Margaret Howell (Q3291)
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Margaret Howell is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Margaret Howell |
Margaret Howell is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
That’s the thing with the Paris show schedule: From designer to designer, show to show, a mood shift is positively guaranteed. That was certainly the case when going from the bravura maximalist theater of Alessandro Michele’s runway debut for Valentino to the cheery, welcoming calm of Margaret Howell’s showroom, where Howell and her design directors, Rosamund Ward (she oversees women) and Ioannis Cholidis (and he men), were on hand to talk through the collection.It was a very desirable, considered, and effortless mix of linen button-back dresses, belted raincoats, slouchy (to a degree) trousers, and layers of shirts (some cut to a new longer length), as well as unconstructed jackets with the ease of shirting, wide shorts, and sweaters that felt classic yet were imbued with a newness of fit, being that little bit looser and that little bit shorter. All of this came in a palette that felt traditional—browns, black, grays, a chalky white, and the softest greens—yet also reimagined to feel new, as if striving to find previously unimagined shades. (I loved that the pale blue-gray was, apparently, the result of a turnip-dyeing process.) All were worked across the likes of linen, Swiss cotton, denim, cotton drill, cashmere, and crisp wool.Yet despite the obvious aesthetic differences between Howell and the label that showed before her, something unites them: How you bring the past into the present, make it resonate, make it sing, make it feel alive. Howell is well versed in that. It’s a tribute to her intelligence and sensitivity as a designer that she can revisit elements of what she has done before because she can see how they connect to the everyday reality of how people dress in the here and now, often triggered by her noticing how people are dressing and putting themselves together.Howell’s aesthetic might sometimes reverberate with the past—her own or from some period of the 20th century (spring 2025, for instance, had some touches of the 1920s; the tunic-y patch-pocket shirt, say, or the collar on a sweater)—but the attitude and mindset are rigorously and undeniably of today. I’ve often thought she sees time as part of her creative process quite differently from other designers; plenty of the latter will tell you they want constancy while actually always wanting to relentlessly (and needlessly sometimes) move the hands on the clock forward, convincing you to discard everything that went before.
29 September 2024
Margaret Howell is allergic to branding, so it was a surprise to see a monogram sneak its way into her fall collection. That said, it was more of a cipher than a logo, comprising a tiny “MH” written in her own hand and stitched on the pocket of a vegetable-dyed shirt. The brand’s head of menswear, Ioannis Cholidis, had persuaded Howell to experiment after having discovered a similarly adorned pocket on a pair of raspberry silk pajamas in the archive. It took several goes to get the handwriting correct. “It is odd when you’re consciously writing, something always goes awry,” said Howell during an appointment in Paris. “When I was a child, we used to have transfers that you ironed onto the fabric and then embroidered on top. Now that was a long time ago.”The venerable British label also has a new managing director, Caroline Attwood, who takes the baton from Richard Craig, a company veteran who steered the ship for 34 years and has now retired. Most recently CEO of handbag label Ally Capellino, another resolutely un-shouty British brand, Attwood’s CV merges product and commercial stripes, with spells at Mulberry and Anya Hindmarch. Having joined in November 2023, she’s still in full immersion mode, from exploring the basement beneath the Wigmore Street store in London (“There are some beautiful pieces of furniture being stored down there!”) to meeting key partners in Japan, where she travels next month. Where does she see key opportunities for this much-loved brand? “It’s early days, but I think there are lots, from stores in different markets, thinking about developing collections for wholesale, the homewares side, and behind the scenes in terms of infrastructure and setting things up for the future. For me, it’s the dream job,” she said.If things are changing at the top, it was reassuring to see that only the tiniest tweaks have been made to the collection. The headlines: Trousers were a little slouchier for fall, with a baggy leg and hems that pool at the ankle rather than turn up; meanwhile waists were a touch more defined, with waxed-cotton raincoats cinched with leather belts, for instance. Elsewhere the collection was a ramble through the practical, pleasingly polished lineup of wardrobe heroes MH fans know and love.
Some favorites: a reversible shearling waistcoat, made in London, and surprisingly lightweight; a British wool cropped bomber jacket from the MHL line; a pair of long corduroy shorts adapted from the archive to give the impression of a chic French culotte; a superchunky cotton-cashmere scarf; and a peaked-lapel narrow black blazer in British barathea. Oh, and that blue-gray shirt signed “MH”—a relaxed button-up with IYKYK flair.
3 March 2024
There’s a crisp dependability to Margaret Howell’s clothes that feels fresh whatever the season, but particularly during the back-to-school period of sharpen-your-pencils September. Though we were meeting in her Paris Place de la Madeleine store to parse the spring collection, the wardrobe staples that hung neatly pressed on the racks could have skipped out the door (and straight into a lecture theater) then and there. Shirts that embody the perfect combination of crunchy but soft to the touch, precisely pleated skirts, soft-hanging jackets, waterproof ponchos—all were present and correct, infused with Howell’s relaxed charm and subtle eye for detail.On the school uniform theme, Howell confided that as a child she loved hers, which included a white shirt, a V-neck sweater, and a skirt. Numerous collegiate touches found their way into this offering, run through in pleasingly minute detail by her head of womenswear, Rosamund Ward, and head of menswear, Ioannis Cholidis, from a collar on a silk shirt loosely inspired by those of Japanese schoolgirls to sweaters that had a ribbed, striped trim reminiscent of a prep-school cricket team. The look-book styling, which paired tailored shorts with knee-high socks and roomy, wide-leg jeans with a white shirt and a gently knotted silk tie, further emphasized a campus mood. Then there were the vintage Howell preoccupations: a chunky leather belt to cinch the waist of a wear-anywhere linen shirtdress, a faded pink linen scarf printed with roses. “I used to go to jumble sales and find lovely silk scarves,” Howell reminisced, soft-spoken and self-effacing as ever, as she retreated to a back room with a cup of tea.As for newness? The brand contents itself with tweaking originals from the archive and experimenting with the weight of fabrics rather than radically reinventing. Besides, as her longtime supporter Margot Henderson, the London chef and cofounder of the cult restaurant Rochelle Canteen, once said of Howell’s clothes: “You don’t wear them out; you wear them in.” Still, to the seasoned Margaret Howell shopper, there were some relative novelties: a lightweight, indigo denim shirtdress, made in Japan, with neat little black horn buttons; a delectable cream cotton-twill boilersuit with a funnel neck; a boyish checked midiskirt, styled in the look book with a techy pair of black Mizuno running shoes and a boxy cropped black jacket.
And a surprise: hanging in one corner was a brown-hued shirtdress in cotton-poplin, printed with Liberty’s Hera peacock feather motif, with a black collar, cuffs, and hem lining. “We have elements of pattern when it feels right,” said Ward. “Margaret worked with Liberty in the late ’70s and ’80s. We actually keep a lot of archive stuff, so we had all her swatch books from when she had a relationship with Liberty.” As a wild-card, new-season entry, it was happily familiar.
1 October 2023
Seeing a Margaret Howell show is one thing. Yet it’s a whole other experience to have Howell and her design heads—Rosamund Ward for women’s; Ioannis Cholidis for men’s—take you through the collection look by look, piece by piece. (And frankly it was a pretty fab experience at that.) Of course, designer show and tell isn’t exactly a rare occurrence in fashion. Studio and showroom visits are a dime a dozen.It’s just that there’s something about a deep dive into not only Howell’s vision for fall 2023, but her whole ethos of fashion, a place where modernity and the past happily and beautifully co-exist, that reveals more than a show ever could. Get up close and personal and you’re reminded that with Howell nuance is everything. Not to mention that any given collection is part of an ongoing narrative: How many times do a designer and her team discuss whether to swap the belt loops on a skirt during the appointment? At a quick count, almost never. Yet that’s the thing: she’s fluent in a design language which is entirely comfortable with constant evolution.For instance: This coming fall’s gesture of altering the length of one of Howell’s superlative softly unstructured jackets, denuded of any formality, which will run longer and looser for women, the better to accommodate one of her cotton shirts newly injected with a volume that’s capacious, allowing the hem to trail from underneath. (With Fall 2023 shaping up to be the Season of The Jacket—I know I’ve said that elsewhere this season, but honestly, it is—one of hers could be the way to get into the look if the idea of big shoulders is too much for you to, well, shoulder.) Kilts, the kind of traditional piece of British clothing Howell has long worked her magic with, are reimagined in black, and for men; it could be a really novel twist on black tie, perhaps, or just the thing to wear with her roomy hoodies and this fall’s update on the duffel coat.The brilliant craft, heritage fabrics, and pragmatic and totally unselfconscious gender fluidity (the term might be recent, but Howell’s been doing it for years) are all present and terrifically correct here. That’s heightened by the way Howell chose to mix up her mainline collection with her more casual, sportier MHL line.
There are ever so slightly oversized raglan sleeved coats (inspired by a design in her archive) in a plaid checked wool by the trad British fabric maker Fox Brothers; workwear and track pants in cotton woven to miraculously feel both soft and yielding but also with a pleasing crispness; and vaguely 1920s dresses with all the ease of tees which beg to be layered up every which way. The same is true of her utilitarian men’s collarless shirting, with their v-necks; actual tees, to make everything feel that bit more easy, treated to look a little lived in; and, square cut gilets in English shearling which would look good thrown over just about everything here, or more importantly, everything you’ve already got in your own closet.Out of all this springs two thoughts. Firstly, the notion that while fashion rushes onwards, with Big Flashy Narratives to the fore, there’s something pleasing, reassuring and, frankly, inspiring, about constancy. In the harried and uncertain times we are in, it can feel like a welcome salve. And secondly, for young indie designers thinking about how to find their way in the era of global behemoths and their ever-increasing market share, Howell gives a salutary lesson in how you can start small with a clear voice and vision and last the course by staying true to yourself, growing and evolving over time. That’s true even if where you start isn’t necessarily where you end up. Gesturing to a display of cozy neutrally toned balaclavas, Howell laughed, and reminisced about how she’d started her career by knitting up purple ones herself. Purple balaclavas! It was like discovering Prince wore tweed hacking jackets when he wasn’t gyrating in panne velvet. Yet as Howell reveals season after season, even if you think you know the label, there’s always room to learn something new.
7 March 2023
The lookbook and video accompanying Margaret Howell’s collection this season found the designer in a particularly spirited mood. The bread and butter staples of her relaxed but impeccably crafted offering were all present and correct, but with the help of her long-time stylist Beat Bolliger, there was a touch of something playfully off-kilter too: the lip of a shirt collar peeking over the top of a thick jersey vest; a shirt with a neckerchief attached that poked out at an angle; tops only loosely tucked into trousers to reveal an unexpected flash of torso. At 76, Howell remains the doyenne of relaxed British tailoring, but the youthful spirit of her clothes is ever-present.As always, these were tactile clothes that rewarded being seen up close; to be touched and turned over to reveal the extraordinary craftsmanship that underpins them. Revisiting pieces from the brand’s extensive archives, Howell and her design team gently updated a handful of her staples—boxy knitwear, bomber jackets, crisp white shirting—by exaggerating the proportions, with trousers for men featuring a carefully considered slouch, and women’s trousers coming in navy pinstripes and refreshing plaster whites, but cinched or elasticated at the waist for ease of wear. The subtle but seductive color palette cycled through Howell’s beloved earth tones of burnt sienna and chocolatey browns, as well as a particularly eye-catching shade of moss green on knitwear.Most intriguing, perhaps, was the latest chapter of Howell’s collaboration with Fred Perry. First debuting in 2018 with a tennis-inspired collection that meshed their worlds surprisingly seamlessly, they returned this time around with a series of butter-soft knit polos, track pants with zip details, and jersey sweater vests the color of orange peel. While she may not be historically known for sportswear, Howell’s broader emphasis on comfort ensures these two worlds dovetail more neatly than you might expect. Browsing through the racks of clothes that intermingled Howell’s mainline and her popular MHL diffusion, it wasn’t hard to envision some of the sportier Fred Perry pieces being thrown into the mix too—all worn with an ease that reflects Howell’s very British brand of cool. As Howell well knows, after all, slow and steady wins the race.
20 September 2022
The quiet beauty of Margaret Howell’s work reveals itself over time: the quality of a jacket that develops a charming, weathered patina as it’s worn in over the years, or the sense that her hefty knits are robust enough to be passed on from generation to generation. It informs her approach to seasonal collections, too. Rather than unveiling a dramatically new offering every six months, each lookbook feels like an incremental step forward from the last; and with her meticulously managed archive, they often riff on patterns and silhouettes from collections crafted many decades ago. The new twists and tweaks are always there—you just have to look a little more closely than usual to find them.This time around, changes came in the magnified proportions Howell has been playing around with over the past few seasons. There were casual, workwear-inflected blazers that came boxy and oversized—cut in everything from luxurious black velvet to thick, satisfyingly chunky gray tweed to tough Japanese moleskins—as well as shirts with playfully exaggerated large collars and baggy trousers that were deliberately sliced above the ankle for a shape that felt firmly of the moment. A particular highlight was a pair of waxed fisherman’s jackets in butter yellow and hunter green, popping from the pages of Howell’s stylishly-assembled lookbook.“I think some of the archive pieces are still very relevant, but obviously we always give them a new interpretation with fabric, color, or length,” said Howell of this process of rediscovering and updating. “We do design very wearable clothes, but it’s great fun to mix them up and find there’s something fresh in them still.” She noted that when pulling a standard ’70s shirt from the archive and laying it alongside one from 2022, they look like they’re made for David and Goliath. It’s the kind of thing you only notice when you have an archive as extensive as hers, speaking not only to her impressive knowledge of fashion history but also her ability to keep her eye trained on the now—to use that erudition to keep evolving.
Another way in which the 75-year-old designer’s endless curiosity continues to shine is in her shrewd instinct for collaboration—whether her decades-long relationships with the textile mills she visits every season in person to touch and feel their latest fabrications, or her ongoing partnerships with specialist garment manufacturers like the coat makers Mackintosh and cobblers Tricker’s, each of whom features in Howell’s current collection. The most intriguing addition, however, is the Japanese sportswear giant Mizuno, with whom Howell has developed rainproof ponchos, waterproof walking trousers, and a packable tote bag.The idea of these technical fabrics entering the rarefied world of Howell’s designs, which one tends to associate with a certain kind of mid-century-obsessed, chic London literary type or discerning Tokyo design junkie, is not as strange as it might initially seem. “It's always been casual, hasn’t it?” Howell said of her work. “It’s meant for an active life, and for the individual choice of putting this with that. It all relates to really useful clothing—that was always the stimulus for me.” She’s right: however palpably luxurious and impeccably-made, her designs have always served as something of a riposte to the buttoned-up codes of Britain’s style heritage. So it’s a delight to see that, after 50 years in the business, Howell is still willing to plunge into new waters.
6 March 2022
In her show notes this season, Margaret Howell described her process as one of “review and renewal.” You might not initially think of Howell’s steady, near-seasonless approach to design as one of constant renewal, but on closer inspection, it’s a maxim that holds true. After celebrating 50 years in the business last year, Howell has been quietly updating some of her classic pieces from the 1970s and ’80s—all stored in an archive a few blocks away from her flagship store in Marylebone—and casting them in a fresh new light with a few quiet tweaks.While the utility and studied minimalism that has made her a stalwart of the British fashion scene was all present and correct, Howell also added a few more mischievous notes this season. In the lookbook, washed wax cotton sou’wester hats came cheekily tilted askew, while silk bandanas were tied around models’ necks, fluttering in the artificial wind of the studio in a way that gently recalled the irreverent spirit of Ray Petri’s London-centric ’80s Buffalo movement. Howell’s signature chore coats were nipped in at the waist with utilitarian belts, while loose navy trousers were tucked into white socks pulled far above the ankle, pantaloon-style, making for a more playful silhouette than usual.Delightful they may be, but you don’t necessarily come to Howell for the more offbeat moments seen in her dynamic lookbook images, but instead for reliable (and effortlessly timeless) wardrobe staples. Don’t worry: she has you covered there too. As ever, the highlights were in the tactility of Howell’s irresistible combinations of textures: crisp cotton gauze shirts dyed a sherbet yellow underneath a perfect day-to-night linen trapeze dress—featuring pockets, of course—or for men, stiff Japanese denim jackets over buttery soft Egyptian cotton tees. Light and easy summer knits came in subdued, earthy shades, while the tailoring had a relaxed feel, with some of the women’s trousers blooming into a subtle flare. Balancing her reliable eye for functionality with something that felt breezy and looser, for Howell’s loyal army of fans, there was plenty here to be charmed by—and with the youthful styling of her lookbook, there might be a few pieces for a new audience, too.
17 September 2021
In her show notes this season, Margaret Howell described her process as one of “review and renewal.” You might not initially think of Howell’s steady, near-seasonless approach to design as one of constant renewal, but on closer inspection, it’s a maxim that holds true. After celebrating 50 years in the business last year, Howell has been quietly updating some of her classic pieces from the 1970s and ’80s—all stored in an archive a few blocks away from her flagship store in Marylebone—and casting them in a fresh new light with a few gentle tweaks.While the utility and studied minimalism that has made her a stalwart of the British fashion scene was all present and correct, Howell also added a few more mischievous notes this season. In the lookbook, washed wax cotton sou’wester hats came cheekily tilted askew, while silk bandanas were tied around models’ necks, fluttering in the artificial wind of the studio in a way that gently recalled the irreverent spirit of Ray Petri’s London-centric ’80s Buffalo movement. Howell’s signature chore coats were nipped in at the waist with utilitarian belts, while loose navy trousers were tucked into white socks pulled far above the ankle, pantaloon-style, making for a more playful silhouette than usual.Delightful they may be, but you don’t necessarily come to Howell for the more offbeat moments seen in her dynamic lookbook images, but instead for reliable (and effortlessly timeless) wardrobe staples. Don’t worry: She has you covered there, too. As ever, the highlights were in the tactility of Howell’s irresistible combinations of textures: crisp cotton gauze shirts dyed a sherbet yellow underneath a perfect day-to-night linen trapeze dress—featuring pockets, of course—or for men, stiff Japanese denim jackets over buttery soft Egyptian cotton tees. Light and easy summer knits came in subdued, earthy shades, while the tailoring had a relaxed feel, with some of the women’s trousers blooming into a subtle flair. Balancing her reliable eye for functionality with something that felt breezy and looser, for Howell’s loyal army of fans, there was plenty here to be charmed by—and with the youthful styling of her lookbook, there might be a few pieces for a new audience, too.
17 September 2021
“Am I allowed to touch that?” Weird as it may seem, being given permission to handle a Fair Isle sweater at Margaret Howell’s showroom felt like a giddy thrill. Well, that might be overdoing it; Margaret Howell and all her works are practically anti-thrilling on principle. But the experience of being able to touch clothes again IRL after more than a year of distanced fashion reporting was (literally) sensational.The touchy-feelies just begged to be performed because this Fair Isle sweater—in two slightly different beige-y colorways on both the female and male sides of the collection—was made in “undyed sheep wool,” according to the house notes. Verdict? A bit crispy to the touch, yet soft enough to put near to the skin. Knitted loosely on a pattern as if someone might have passed it down for a couple of generations—yet, of course, exactly right for now.London is unlocked a bit, streets are lined with tables packed with people enjoying eating outdoors (wrapped in coats, scarves, and blankets—but never mind!), and it’s possible, per prebooked COVID-19 protocols, to go on fashion appointments again. Thus the IRL encounter with the Margaret Howell collection.As far as her Fair Isle sweaters go, there’s nothing more ragingly fashionable for next winter, as anyone who has eyes to see well knows. In the context of Margaret Howells’s ever-wear wardrobe, however, they simultaneously jump out and calmly fit in. Which is exactly one of the nuances of British classicism that she and her team seem to use as a benchmark for the good-looking, useful, and non-trendy things they make look as if they just happened, or might have been around forever.Thus, the importance of how familiar Margaret Howell things feel to the touch. There are Army green single-breasted raincoats for women and men that have a slightly rumpled, ready broken-in texture. Harris tweed coats which are somehow soft and pliable. Loads of accessories too, like hand-knitted scarves, berets, and usefully capacious bags made by the saddlery company Walsall in the English Midlands. A knitted bandana that is handily a scout scarf or a COVID-19 face covering. The joy of it is how completely suited everything is to life in 2021, right through—we can vouch—to how it all feels.
30 April 2021
If there’s anyone who is surely in possession of the ideal pandemic-proof collection, it is Margaret Howell. Here it is: Her whole world of utilitarian comfort for women and men, laid out with a perfect sense of economy in the space of 35 pictures. After 50 years in the business—she is quietly celebrating a half-century—her perfectionist dedication to designing clothes with a purpose could hardly be more calmingly relevant to the predicament we find ourselves in today.In one sense, this season’s offerings don’t look terribly different from the last, or any other, come to that. That’s intrinsic to the beauty of what she does: her concentration on making clothes that fit continuously into the background of lived experience, stoically allowing the bandwagon of fashion to pass her by. Yet, her work is also a study in incremental change. Here you can pick it up: a slight tendency toward a bracing sense of military uniform, the totally contemporary idea that these garments are mostly genderless.A shared wardrobe for people who are probably working from home, living a life of local shopping and markets interspersed with walks in the country—well, how many of us will identify with that now? For that great social readjustment, Margaret Howell has all the answers.
20 September 2020
If there’s anyone who is surely in possession of the ideal pandemic-proof collection, it is Margaret Howell. Here it is: Her whole world of utilitarian comfort for women and men, laid out with a perfect sense of economy in the space of 35 pictures. After 50 years in the business—she is quietly celebrating a half-century—her perfectionist dedication to designing clothes with a purpose could hardly be more calmingly relevant to the predicament we find ourselves in today.In one sense, this season’s offerings don’t look terribly different from the last, or any other, come to that. That’s intrinsic to the beauty of what she does: her concentration on making clothes that fit continuously into the background of lived experience, stoically allowing the bandwagon of fashion to pass her by. Yet her work is also a study in incremental change. Here you can pick it up: a slight tendency toward a bracing sense of military uniform, the totally contemporary idea that these garments are mostly genderless.A shared wardrobe for people who are probably working from home, living a life of local shopping and markets interspersed with walks in the country—well, how many of us will identify with that now? For that great social readjustment, Margaret Howell has all the answers.
20 September 2020
Margaret Howell has been an enduring presence in British fashion for more than five decades, quietly crafting practical and simply elegant clothes that are made to last. It’s a value proposition that couldn’t be more resonant in today’s climate, as the industry begins to take stock of its excesses. If buying less with a more considered mind-set is now the modern way, then Howell was years ahead of the curve.The designer seemed to be signaling that to the audience at her show on the South Bank. The first model appeared in a crisp white shirt that was totally unadorned and grounded with sensible Dr. Martens–style black boots. The next came out wearing little more than an oversize blazer, and was followed by another in a stand-alone, three-quarter-length toggle coat. It was Howell stripped back to her most essential parts.The series of looks that came after offered subtle ways to update those classic tropes. The box-pleat skirts were a nice counterpoint to the masculine tailoring and lent the collection a schoolyard charm paired with knee-high socks, felt kerchiefs, and knitted ties. Notoriously shy, Howell did not take a bow at the end of her show, though you could imagine her wearing the final outfit in the collection—high-waist, belted pinstriped pants; a smart gray button-down; and monk-strap shoes—a uniform to stand the test of time.
16 February 2020
Margaret Howell has been an enduring presence in British fashion for more than five decades, quietly crafting practical and simply elegant clothes that are made to last. It’s a value proposition that couldn’t be more resonant in today’s climate, as the industry begins to take stock of its excesses. If buying less with a more considered mind-set is now the modern way, then Howell was years ahead of the curve.The designer seemed to be signaling that to the audience at her show on the South Bank. The first model appeared in a crisp white shirt that was totally unadorned and grounded with sensible Dr. Martens–style black boots. The next came out wearing little more than an oversize blazer, and was followed by another in a stand-alone, three-quarter-length toggle coat. It was Howell stripped back to her most essential parts.The series of looks that came after offered subtle ways to update those classic tropes. The box-pleat skirts were a nice counterpoint to the masculine tailoring and lent the collection a schoolyard charm paired with knee-high socks, felt kerchiefs, and knitted ties. Notoriously shy, Howell did not take a bow at the end of her show, though you could imagine her wearing the final outfit in the collection—high-waist, belted pinstriped pants; a smart gray button-down; and monk-strap shoes—a uniform to stand the test of time.
16 February 2020
Excuse me for this, but I am going to go out on a limb and talk about the show after Margaret Howell’s before we even get to what she showed on the runway. (Bear with me, there’s a method to this madness.) Victoria Beckham was up after Margaret Howell, and outside her show was a quiet and respectful demonstration from the London chapter of Extinction Rebellion. Pre–London shows, there was plenty of chatter about the eco-activist group shutting down the city’s Fashion Week. So far that hasn’t happened, but truth be told does it even need to? Anyone attending the run of Spring 2020 shows can’t not be thinking about the environmental impact of fashion and what it means to be seeing new clothes at a time when we’re consuming and discarding at an ever faster clip. There’s a growing sense that whatever we buy from now on—and a moment of unflinching, cold-light-of-day reality here: continue to buy we will—had better come with some value, some staying power, some sense of it making a meaningful contribution to our wardrobes.This brings us to—you knew we’d get there eventually—Margaret Howell, a designer whose long-standing raison d’être has been to go slow and steady while others around her were losing their heads going fast and frenetic. Her collection for next season, regardless of whether it’s for women or for men (she showed both on her runway, at the Rambert dance school in the shadow of the National Theatre), demonstrated yet again her enviably strong and definitive handwriting—utilitarian, tailored, unfussy—which, by its thoughtful and considerate inclusivity, allows for all sorts of individual entry points into her look. Hers is a vocabulary of clothes—the trench, the shirt, the blazer—she reexamines and reinvents by fractional degrees, the easier to keep and make your own.For Spring 2020 that means plenty of suiting, with higher buttoning; looser-cut jackets worn with tapering trousers tucked into slouchy socks and flat leather sandals; and other times substantially collared shirts atop fluid Bermuda shorts, again with the omnipresent socks-and-sandals combo. Often they came out in mirror-image gender pairings, effectively the same outfit on a guy, then a girl, or vice versa. Howell has long presented the case for the notion of gender irrelevance, prioritizing a sense of naturalness and comfort over the artifice and affect offashion; so the olive cotton parka on a guy was cut with the same swinging ease as a drop-waisted dress worn by a woman.
There was also a terrific ’50s abstract linear print that evoked the work of textile designer Lucienne Day, whose graphic patterns appeared at another time when Britain was undergoing a moment of profound change and self-examination. Who’s to say if there wasn’t a sly nod to the current landscape of the United Kingdom as it renegotiates where it is in the world, but the one certainty is that Howell’s clothes exuded a sense of relevance and realness to our lives today. Any one of the looks in this show could have walked straight off the runway onto the street—and last for years to come. Right now that feels like the very best way to be and no higher compliment to pay.
15 September 2019
Excuse me for this, but I am going to go out on a limb and talk about the show after Margaret Howell’s before we even get to what she showed on the runway. (Bear with me, there’s a method to this madness.) Victoria Beckham was up after Margaret Howell, and outside her show was a quiet and respectful demonstration from the London chapter of Extinction Rebellion. Pre–London shows, there was plenty of chatter about the eco-activist group shutting down the city’s Fashion Week. So far that hasn’t happened, but truth be told does it even need to? Anyone attending the run of Spring 2020 shows can’t not be thinking about the environmental impact of fashion and what it means to be seeing new clothes at a time when we’re consuming and discarding at an ever faster clip. There’s a growing sense that whatever we buy from now on—and a moment of unflinching, cold-light-of-day reality here: continue to buy we will—had better come with some value, some staying power, some sense of it making a meaningful contribution to our wardrobes.This brings us to—you knew we’d get there eventually—Margaret Howell, a designer whose long-standing raison d’être has been to go slow and steady while others around her were losing their heads going fast and frenetic. Her collection for next season, regardless of whether it’s for women or for men (she showed both on her runway, at the Rambert dance school in the shadow of the National Theatre), demonstrated yet again her enviably strong and definitive handwriting—utilitarian, tailored, unfussy—which, by its thoughtful and considerate inclusivity, allows for all sorts of individual entry points into her look. Hers is a vocabulary of clothes—the trench, the shirt, the blazer—she reexamines and reinvents by fractional degrees, the easier to keep and make your own.For Spring 2020 that means plenty of suiting, with higher buttoning; looser-cut jackets worn with tapering trousers tucked into slouchy socks and flat leather sandals; and other times substantially collared shirts atop fluid Bermuda shorts, again with the omnipresent socks-and-sandals combo. Often they came out in mirror-image gender pairings, effectively the same outfit on a guy, then a girl, or vice versa. Howell has long presented the case for the notion of gender irrelevance, prioritizing a sense of naturalness and comfort over the artifice and affect offashion; so the olive cotton parka on a guy was cut with the same swinging ease as a drop-waisted dress worn by a woman.
There was also a terrific ’50s abstract linear print that evoked the work of textile designer Lucienne Day, whose graphic patterns appeared at another time when Britain was undergoing a moment of profound change and self-examination. Who’s to say if there wasn’t a sly nod to the current landscape of the United Kingdom as it renegotiates where it is in the world, but the one certainty is that Howell’s clothes exuded a sense of relevance and realness to our lives today. Any one of the looks in this show could have walked straight off the runway onto the street—and last for years to come. Right now that feels like the very best way to be and no higher compliment to pay.
15 September 2019
Here’s a little confession: During the recent New York shows, colleagues and I took to saying, after some show where someone had been too complicated, or overly referential, or pretentious, “Just make clothes.” Sounds so easy, doesn’t it? Just. Make. Clothes. Of course, it’s not easy, at all, especially given the mercurial relationship that so many of us now have with what we want to wear and what we want to buy. Correct me if I am wrong here—and I’m truly happy to be proved otherwise—but has fashion ever been more tricky to navigate? It’s everything about it. The looks that seem to last a nanosecond, hooking us on to the new new thing. The proliferation of (there is no other word) product. And, the increasing (and rightful) rising awareness of the environmental impact of our mad need for more, more, and yet more.No one could ever accuse Margaret Howell of not making clothes, but there’s no “just” about them. They come layered—literally and metaphorically—with so many associations and triggers: Englishness, craft, respect, utility, consideration, tradition, purpose, and a tangible sense of a future. The latter might surprise some who see Howell as a wonderful purveyor of nostalgia, a designer of misty-eyed remembrances of the past. Not so. Her coed show for Fall 2019, held yet again in the Rambert dance space on London’s South Bank, demonstrated how you can take everything you do and stand for, yet still be clear-sighted about what’s needed now—and next.Once again, this was a terrific showing of clothes; clothes that looked like they’d stick around, clothes that weren’t hung up on gender distinctions, clothes that felt like they could be personalized to a point that they’d really feel like yours. An interesting side note to this: Howell has always been a lover of the carefully considered styling flourish, but this season it often felt like the models had actually just put on what they were wearing themselves and figured out how they’d actually want to wear them: the casual rolling of the ankles of ecru cotton drill pants; the cinching of trouser waistbands with sturdy belts; silken scarves trailing from back pockets, a deliciously fey touch in contrast with the slouchier, oversize, and casual feel of the pieces they were worn with.
Those proportions are key, particularly to the great outerwear that was on show: functional/utilitarian coats with breast pockets in black or army green; blazers in brown corduroy or earthy check tweeds, cut with a slope to the shoulders, irrespective of gender; and, the standout, black waxed-cotton anoraks and bomber jackets. These were variously worn with white or salmon pink cotton shirting, ivory sweaters and olive cardigans, and pleated skirts in a graphic 2-D leaf print. Clothes, in other words. And truly effortless, real, and desirable clothes, at that.
17 February 2019
Here’s a little confession: During the recent New York shows, colleagues and I took to saying, after some show where someone had been too complicated, or overly referential, or pretentious, “Just make clothes.” Sounds so easy, doesn’t it? Just. Make. Clothes. Of course, it’s not easy, at all, especially given the mercurial relationship that so many of us now have with what we want to wear and what we want to buy. Correct me if I am wrong here—and I’m truly happy to be proved otherwise—but has fashion ever been more tricky to navigate? It’s everything about it. The looks that seem to last a nanosecond, hooking us on to the new new thing. The proliferation of (there is no other word) product. And, the increasing (and rightful) rising awareness of the environmental impact of our mad need for more, more, and yet more.No one could ever accuse Margaret Howell of not making clothes, but there’s no “just” about them. They come layered—literally and metaphorically—with so many associations and triggers: Englishness, craft, respect, utility, consideration, tradition, purpose, and a tangible sense of a future. The latter might surprise some who see Howell as a wonderful purveyor of nostalgia, a designer of misty-eyed remembrances of the past. Not so. Her coed show for Fall 2019, held yet again in the Rambert dance space on London’s South Bank, demonstrated how you can take everything you do and stand for, yet still be clear-sighted about what’s needed now—and next.Once again, this was a terrific showing of clothes; clothes that looked like they’d stick around, clothes that weren’t hung up on gender distinctions, clothes that felt like they could be personalized to a point that they’d really feel like yours. An interesting side note to this: Howell has always been a lover of the carefully considered styling flourish, but this season it often felt like the models had actually just put on what they were wearing themselves and figured out how they’d actually want to wear them: the casual rolling of the ankles of ecru cotton drill pants; the cinching of trouser waistbands with sturdy belts; silken scarves trailing from back pockets, a deliciously fey touch in contrast with the slouchier, oversize, and casual feel of the pieces they were worn with.
Those proportions are key, particularly to the great outerwear that was on show: functional/utilitarian coats with breast pockets in black or army green; blazers in brown corduroy or earthy check tweeds, cut with a slope to the shoulders, irrespective of gender; and, the standout, black waxed-cotton anoraks and bomber jackets. These were variously worn with white or salmon pink cotton shirting, ivory sweaters and olive cardigans, and pleated skirts in a graphic 2-D leaf print. Clothes, in other words. And truly effortless, real, and desirable clothes, at that.
17 February 2019
Barely a few looks into today’s Margaret Howell show, and one thing became absolutely clear. Howell has been effortlessly doing for years—decades, actually—what so many designers are now grappling with; seamlessly bringing together the vision of how women should look and how men should look, especially if they’re walking the runway at the same time. Well, you’re not getting this directly from Howell herself, but from my own thoughts on the subject after seeing her terrific show. So, to all those busy thinking about contemporary fluidity, here’s a hot tip if you’re at all interested: It’s mind-set first, gender second.That’s how you can, as Howell did for Spring, build a whole collection, world in fact, on the likes of crisply belted single-breasted olive raincoats for all sexes (I could have waxed lyrical about these coats the entire review but don’t worry, I won’t) and likewise, the cotton drill or deep indigo denim pants, some slouchy and trailing the floor, others rolled at the cuff above the ankle to control their tapering volume. Elsewhere, there was a virtual ode to the wearability—and interchangeability—of the collarless shirt, here cut from a cotton soft enough to billow ever so slightly, yet sturdy enough to be able to take a decisive tailoring. It was cut long to extend way past the hem of a snappy bomber or over a full skirt cut from a shot silk whose luster shifted in the light.Some of these pieces are firmly already in the vocabulary of this designer, others—like the polka-dotted collars on the camp shirts or the half-zippered utilitarian sweats—brought a burst of newness. Yet really, in the end, it all comes down to the same thing. Howell sees the preoccupations of those buying her womenswear and those buying her menswear as pretty much the same: utilitarian, understated, and user-friendly enough to sit working away in anyone’s wardrobe for years and years. Even the tweaking of the classics—the desert boot reinterpreted as a derby; the white cotton plimsolls, part of a collaboration with British sportswear company Fred Perry, launching next May—don’t scream One Season Only. (Meanwhile, can we just hear it for the wordplimsoll; time for that to make a comeback, please.)Howell also showed a few very athletic one-piece maillots and (what I imagine were) hybrid cycle shorts–swimming trunks. These were styled with yet more of those shirts, likely for two reasons.
Firstly, there’d be something a little too naked about showing them alone; where’s the romance, where’s the story? And secondly, she is a British designer; after all, when is it ever really warm enough in the U.K. to be wearing swimwear without some kind of cover-up? You see: Always pragmatic.
16 September 2018
Barely a few looks into today’s Margaret Howell show, and one thing became absolutely clear. Howell has been effortlessly doing for years—decades, actually—what so many designers are now grappling with; seamlessly bringing together the vision of how women should look and how men should look, especially if they’re walking the runway at the same time. Well, you’re not getting this directly from Howell herself, but from my own thoughts on the subject after seeing her terrific show. So, to all those busy thinking about contemporary fluidity, here’s a hot tip if you’re at all interested: It’s mind-set first, gender second.That’s how you can, as Howell did for Spring, build a whole collection, world in fact, on the likes of crisply belted single-breasted olive raincoats for all sexes (I could have waxed lyrical about these coats the entire review but don’t worry, I won’t) and likewise, the cotton drill or deep indigo denim pants, some slouchy and trailing the floor, others rolled at the cuff above the ankle to control their tapering volume. Elsewhere, there was a virtual ode to the wearability—and interchangeability—of the collarless shirt, here cut from a cotton soft enough to billow ever so slightly, yet sturdy enough to be able to take a decisive tailoring. It was cut long to extend way past the hem of a snappy bomber or over a full skirt cut from a shot silk whose luster shifted in the light.Some of these pieces are firmly already in the vocabulary of this designer, others—like the polka-dotted collars on the camp shirts or the half-zippered utilitarian sweats—brought a burst of newness. Yet really, in the end, it all comes down to the same thing. Howell sees the preoccupations of those buying her womenswear and those buying her menswear as pretty much the same: utilitarian, understated, and user-friendly enough to sit working away in anyone’s wardrobe for years and years. Even the tweaking of the classics—the desert boot reinterpreted as a derby; the white cotton plimsolls, part of a collaboration with British sportswear company Fred Perry, launching next May—don’t scream One Season Only. (Meanwhile, can we just hear it for the wordplimsoll; time for that to make a comeback, please.)Howell also showed a few very athletic one-piece maillots and (what I imagine were) hybrid cycle shorts–swimming trunks. These were styled with yet more of those shirts, likely for two reasons.
Firstly, there’d be something a little too naked about showing them alone; where’s the romance, where’s the story? And secondly, she is a British designer; after all, when is it ever really warm enough in the U.K. to be wearing swimwear without some kind of cover-up? You see: Always pragmatic.
16 September 2018
Idly swiping through Instagram after today’s Margaret Howell show, a narrative began to emerge on IG Stories; regardless of the age of the person posting, they could all see themselves living in the label for the rest of their lives. I mean, I feel that way too, but some of them were a decade younger than me, maybe (cough) two, or even (violent coughing fit) three. What’s the eternal—and terrific—cross-generational appeal of what Howell does? There’s a line of thinking that it is the unchanging nature of the clothes, that their everlasting quality means they work at any time and for any age. Except, that’s not really the case. To be sure, this British designer works within certain idioms—utility, craft, functionality—but to depict her as never shifting the needle is patently untrue. Perhaps, in fact, she shifts it enough for it always to feel modern and new while still recognizably her.Howell’s co-ed show—she has been showing women’s and men’s together for some time now—underscored the idea that she can find the timely in timelessness to, well, “dramatic effect” is the wrong way to put it, but it was certainly insistent and absolutely consistent. The subtly emphatic shifting of the proportions on pieces that are unquestionably hers—the androgynous blazer, the tweedy coat, the rugged work pant—looked simultaneously fresh and refreshed. The wider, sloping shoulder on a jacket (for a boy or a girl) as a nod to the current preference for oversize? That was new. The low-slung, slouchier shape on a cotton drill pant that was also cropped, exposing a white-cotton-rib-socked ankle? That was new, too. And while it might not seem much in today’s world where big, dramatic design statements play out better on social media, the small, considered addition of a pie-crust frill on a crisp cotton poplin shirt felt kind of seismic—and looked great into the bargain. Somehow, all of this contrived to create a collection that looked real and cool and utterly desirable to wear this fall, but way beyond that, too. For a lifetime, in fact.
18 February 2018
Idly swiping through Instagram after today’s Margaret Howell show, a narrative began to emerge on IG Stories; regardless of the age of the person posting, they could all see themselves living in the label for the rest of their lives. I mean, I feel that way too, but some of them were a decade younger than me, maybe (cough) two, or even (violent coughing fit) three. What’s the eternal—and terrific—cross-generational appeal of what Howell does? There’s a line of thinking that it is the unchanging nature of the clothes, that their everlasting quality means they work at any time and for any age. Except, that’s not really the case. To be sure, this British designer works within certain idioms—utility, craft, functionality—but to depict her as never shifting the needle is patently untrue. Perhaps, in fact, she shifts it enough for it always to feel modern and new while still recognizably her.Howell’s co-ed show—she has been showing women’s and men’s together for some time now—underscored the idea that she can find the timely in timelessness to, well, “dramatic effect” is the wrong way to put it, but it was certainly insistent and absolutely consistent. The subtly emphatic shifting of the proportions on pieces that are unquestionably hers—the androgynous blazer, the tweedy coat, the rugged work pant—looked simultaneously fresh and refreshed. The wider, sloping shoulder on a jacket (for a boy or a girl) as a nod to the current preference for oversize? That was new. The low-slung, slouchier shape on a cotton drill pant that was also cropped, exposing a white-cotton-rib-socked ankle? That was new, too. And while it might not seem much in today’s world where big, dramatic design statements play out better on social media, the small, considered addition of a pie-crust frill on a crisp cotton poplin shirt felt kind of seismic—and looked great into the bargain. Somehow, all of this contrived to create a collection that looked real and cool and utterly desirable to wear this fall, but way beyond that, too. For a lifetime, in fact.
18 February 2018
Should one require proof that Margaret Howell is able to magically transform even the most prosaic piece of clothing, the kind of thing usually balled up and thrown way to the back of the wardrobe, then consider what she did with the humble boxer short for Spring 2018. Rendering them in pristine black or ecru cotton poplin, concealed fly and elasticated waist intact, she cut them airily and then partnered them with everything from a navy pinstriped blazer to a khaki nylon fatigue jacket, which in turn were accessorized with black ankle socks and buffed and polished black flat Mary Janes. Yep, despite this being a co-ed show, presenting both her women’s and men’s collections, these boxers were strictly for the girls, outwardly, at least. The guys, on the other hand, might have been wearing theirs under their just-above-the-knee crisp, tailored Bermuda shorts, but I couldn’t say that with any certainty. What was plainly evident was how great they looked worn with jaunty graphic shirts, which resembled something a particularly hip jockey might wear, or with Howell’s latest (and hugely covetable) incarnation of the Mackintosh raincoat, now rendered to look like a duffel coat, complete with toggle-and-twine fastenings.Let’s be clear, though. None of this was a spin on gender duality, or postandrogyny, or such like. Howell’s raison d’être for the four-plus decades of her career is that the pleasure of clothes lies in their functionality, regardless of whether she is designing for men or women; at this label, “fashion” is something to be inhabited and enjoyed, and for a long time at that. In an era of Would Someone Please Take Their Finger Off the Fast-Forward Button of brutal trend after brutal trend, with Howell’s clothes you’re gripped by how the slightest recalibration of something can make you look at it anew. Consider the drop of her jeans for men (a higher and deeper rise), the waist cinched with a sturdy leather belt. Or a series of knit banded tanks for women, body-con but from a bygone age, worn with gently pleated full skirts and yet another variation on shorts. Howell’s Spring lineup was a virtual primer in rigor and restraint, including the limited, but effective, color palette, where a preponderance of black and white was leavened with the aforementioned ecru and a vivid shade of green. That was it, no more, no less. Like the collection itself, it was enough, but it was also everything.
17 September 2017
Should one require proof that Margaret Howell is able to magically transform even the most prosaic pieces of clothing, the kind of thing usually balled up and thrown way to the back of the wardrobe, then consider what she did with the humble boxer short for Spring 2018. Rendered in pristine black or ecru cotton poplin, concealed fly and elasticated waist intact, she cut them airily and then partnered them with everything from a navy pinstriped blazer to a khaki nylon fatigue jacket, which in turn were accessorized with black ankle socks and buffed and polished black flat Mary-Janes. Yep, despite this being a co-ed show, presenting both her women’s and men’s collections, these boxers were strictly for the girls, outwardly, at least; the guys, on the other hand, might have been wearing theirs under their just above the knee crisp tailored Bermuda shorts, but I couldn’t say that with any certainty. What was plainly evident was how great they looked worn with jaunty graphic shirts which resembled something a particularly hip jockey might wear, or Howell's latest (and hugely covetable) incarnation of the Mackintosh raincoat, now rendered to look like a duffel coat, complete with toggle and twine fastenings.Let’s be clear, though. None of this was a spin on gender duality, or post-androgyny, or such like. Howell’s raison d’etre for the four-plus decades of her career is that the pleasure of clothes lies in their functionality, regardless if she is designing for men or women; at this label, ‘fashion’ is something to be inhabited and enjoyed, and for a long time at that. In an era of Would Someone Please Take Their Finger Off The Fast Forward Button of brutal trend after brutal trend, with Howell’s clothes you’re gripped by how the slightest recalibration of something can make you look at it anew. Consider the drop of her jeans for men (a higher and deeper rise), the waist cinched with a sturdy leather belt. Or a series of knit banded tanks for women, body-con but from a bygone age, worn with gently pleated full skirts and yet another variation on shorts. Howell’s Spring lineup was a virtual primer in rigor and restraint, including the limited but effective color palette, where a preponderance of black and white was leavened with the aforementioned ecru and a vivid shade of green. That was it, no more, no less. Like the collection itself, it was enough, but it was also everything.
17 September 2017
Margaret Howell, you had me at “Suzanne.” The Nina Simone version of the Leonard Cohen standard wafted unobtrusively at the start of Howell’s show on (what felt like on jet lag) a just-as-day-is-breaking Sunday morning in the shadow of London’s National Theatre. That song—and indeed, the show—was a bit like a warm bath; you know exactly what to expect, but you’re more than happy to be experiencing it. The usual line about Howell would normally go something like this: She’s a national treasure dedicated, at least at first glance, to the art of unchanged dressing—crisp shirting, tweedy overcoats, scrubby woolens, and oversize trenches with the perfect ratio of oversize slouch to tailored control. (Airy volume at the back, ever-so-slightly loosely belted at the front, should you be wondering.)The national treasure bit is right—not just in her sense of eternal and perennial pieces, but in the way Howell has always quietly extolled all sorts of British craft and design, usually of a progressive, humanist bent. Yet that can also make Howell sound like she’s stuck in the same place, telling the same stories, which, on the strength of her Fall 2017 collection for both sexes, is simply not the case. She knows how to calibrate those classics—the standouts this time around: flannel workwear pants, androgynous double-breasted coats, a hybrid of a schoolmarm box pleat skirt and a kilt—with a distinct whiff of today. The shirting that can easily be worn half-tucked or layered one on top of the other. The pants that tapered to the ankle and are secured at the hem with a buttoned tab to further emphasize the silhouette. And a couple of skater-ish flourishes, namely a wooly bobble hat or (shades of the New York shows just finished here) an ultra-long belt tightly buckled, the rest of it left to trail scarf-like down the leg.She even took what might be one of the most unexpected items of recent times—the apron—and layered it with boyish blazers and pants. Hers seemed to belong in the shared Venn diagram between Vita Sackville-West and the type worn by that cute girl or boy you’ve seen at a Brooklyn (or Brooklyn wannabe) coffee shop, which, in its mix of a glorious past and a relevant now, seems totally and perfectly Margaret Howell.
19 February 2017
Margaret Howell, you had me at “Suzanne.” The Nina Simone version of the Leonard Cohen standard wafted unobtrusively at the start of Howell’s show on (what felt like on jet lag) a just-as-day-is-breaking Sunday morning in the shadow of London’s National Theatre. That song—and indeed, the show—was a bit like a warm bath; you know exactly what to expect, but you’re more than happy to be experiencing it. The usual line about Howell would normally go something like this: She’s a national treasure dedicated, at least at first glance, to the art of unchanged dressing—crisp shirting, tweedy overcoats, scrubby woolens, and oversize trenches with the perfect ratio of oversize slouch to tailored control. (Airy volume at the back, ever-so-slightly loosely belted at the front, should you be wondering.)The national treasure bit is right—not just in her sense of eternal and perennial pieces, but in the way Howell has always quietly extolled all sorts of British craft and design, usually of a progressive, humanist bent. Yet that can also make Howell sound like she’s stuck in the same place, telling the same stories, which, on the strength of her Fall 2017 collection for both sexes, is simply not the case. She knows how to calibrate those classics—the standouts this time around: flannel workwear pants, androgynous double-breasted coats, a hybrid of a schoolmarm box pleat skirt and a kilt—with a distinct whiff of today. The shirting that can easily be worn half-tucked or layered one on top of the other. The pants that tapered to the ankle and are secured at the hem with a buttoned tab to further emphasize the silhouette. And a couple of skater-ish flourishes, namely a wooly bobble hat or (shades of the New York shows just finished here) an ultra-long belt tightly buckled, the rest of it left to trail scarf-like down the leg.She even took what might be one of the most unexpected items of recent times—the apron—and layered it with boyish blazers and pants. Hers seemed to belong in the shared Venn diagram between Vita Sackville-West and the type worn by that cute girl or boy you’ve seen at a Brooklyn (or Brooklyn wannabe) coffee shop, which, in its mix of a glorious past and a relevant now, seems totally and perfectly Margaret Howell.
19 February 2017
AtMargaret Howell’s Spring show today, the designer chose two renditions of the song “Hotel California” for her soundtrack—first, performed as a cover, and at the finale, the original track sung by the Eagles. With the collection’s easygoing, folksy, and somehow coastal vibes—see knitted boxer shorts, a wide-stripe boat-neck tee, and linen day scarves—one might’ve assumed Howell was on a go-west, possibly retro Golden State kick. But in the designer’s typically mum fashion, she denied it: “We just chose music that we like,” she said, seeming amused that this reporter would ask such a question.Even so, this was a particularly relaxed Howell. “What’s a little step forward here is the use of lighter fabrics,” she said, such as linen-cotton in tank tops, paper-thin Gore-Tex in trenches (these were great), and even slouchy yarn in fisherman’s knitwear, which arrived with squared necklines and mustard or navy palette. Despite using relatively thick strands, the jumpers looked effortless and beachy. Boot-cut trousers, with the cuffs turned up, furthered the seaside associations—one could almost see them being worn, standing at the shore-break, on a foggy Big Sur morning. Best in show? A linen button-down, clay in color, with windowpane checks. Throw it on and check into the Hotel California.
12 June 2016
Margaret Howellhas98stores in Japan. The fact staggered this American journalist, being from a place where Howell is stocked only in select boutiques, Barneys New York being the highest profile. While her designs lack the leanness and sportiness of U.S. stylistic proclivities (hence the small representation domestically), they are worth a scan for their considered blend of London boyishness and Tokyo eccentricity.Howell said backstage: “What changes over time is what feels right—there’s no specific story.” (There we go again with designers citing their current moods over finite inspirations—though this has consistently been a Howell creed.) There was carryoverfrom Springwith high-waisted cropped trousers and neck scarves (now in jewel-tone bichrome); her “progression of style” arrived with a newfound worn-in-ness, thanks to consciously disheveled and thick-sleeved knits, shapeless macs, and an excellent pair of longer-than-average duffle coats. So, casual affections, with a warm blanket of foible. One might also (though Howell neither confirmed nor denied the inquiry) see nomadism here, given its overall ease, the backpack or two, and Bob Dylan’s “Gotta Travel On” coursing through the skylit room. Abstractly, she offered: “It’s nice to think that it is a flexible, fluid type of thing.”
10 January 2016
"You know when you go to your wardrobe and something doesn't feel right anymore, maybe it's too small? That change—it happens almost imperceptibly," Margaret Howell said after her show. "It is a feeling that affects cuts, materials." Sometimes a designer doesn't need a story to explain a collection, because the story is in fact told by the wearer, in conversation with the clothes. The designer can then only propose what feels right, at this moment—and hopefully, by extension, for Spring 2016.And so we had high-waisted, cropped pants with front pleats; boxy white linen T-shirts; a checked shirt that used black together with the natural color of the linen material; workwear trousers set against a knitted jumper. These were some of the ideas for the Margaret Howell man this time around. The designer singled out the mackintoshes as some of her favorite pieces ("there's just something about them, and I like them long"), then mused on the "little odd thing you could do to polka dots"—which could be seen on the neckerchiefs.But the main theme here was straightforward graphic dressing, like the white pants with a black long coat that opened the show. The short and boxy short-sleeved shirts also felt pleasingly easy on the eye. There weren't any showstopper outfits here, just great menswear pieces created far from the cynicism of much contemporary clothes. And then again, it was certainly plausible that the all-black suit ensemble—that juxtaposed a jacket, which borrowed heavily from the tux, with a pair of pants and shirt that were positively pajamalike—could turn quite a few heads.
14 June 2015
In these Tumblr times of no clear distinction between old and new, the clothes of Margaret Howell seem more at home than they did 10 years ago. What does it matter that she doesn't present anything "new," when new is really just a case of what you're aware of and what feels relevant at the moment? Some people might call this quality of Howell's "timelessness," but clothes are seldom truly timeless. It's more appropriate to see these garments as cultural artifacts, and as a continuing investigation into Britishness.Yet there were movement and evolution here today; they were in the slightly tapered leg of a trouser, and in the sleeveless gray knit top with a carefully added white stripe in the small of the back. A chunky, tucked-in knit sweater with a blown-up argyle pattern in gray looked great, and like many other pieces, it was worn over another knit, in this case a turtleneck. The designer also used accent-color scarves or socks as a way to add energy to a somewhat dour palette (there was a lot of gray on gray). As always, Howell showed her staple white shirt; this season it had echoes of a tuxedo shirt, with a reinforced chest panel. The collection incorporated plenty of little details like that, such as the white shearling peeking out at the top of the buttoning of a coat, or the '60s width of the suit jackets. Once you started looking, you saw. There is a quiet intelligence behind Howell's construction, and she takes the wearer seriously.
11 January 2015
This morning, Margaret Howell gazed at the Polaroids denoting her show's running order and frowned. Yet again she was being asked to provide a sound bite to describe a collection that, for her, was not about fashion, but rather a continuing evolution of classic menswear staples: the cuffed chino, the cotton cable knit, and the boxy two-button gray blazer. "The clothes evolve gradually, and the styling brings them to life," Howell said. Today, that roughly translated as large turn-ups (also popular among the assembled audience), Boy Scout scarves knotted loosely at the throat or tucked inside fine-gauge cotton crewneck sweaters, and the occasional slouchy holdall.Otherwise it was business as usual, and had the models decided to saunter out of Howell's Wigmore Street flagship where the show was held, they would have seamlessly blended in with the comings and goings of London's West End—no one would have batted an eye.In the forty-odd years since Howell first started re-creating vintage men's shirts, her reluctance to jump on the fashion bandwagon has held her in pretty good stead. She's the figurehead of a sizable British business with five stores in London alone and around ninety outlets in Japan in partnership with majority shareholder Anglobal. And from a fashion standpoint, her recent hiring of an archivist (perhaps in preparation for a book?) has led her to further reexamine her design roots and feed them into her current collections. "See this shirt?" she said, pointing to a collarless Howell staple from the latest show. "It's almost exactly the same as the ones I was making in the seventies." Fast-forward four decades and although the fabrication is the same, the overall Howell silhouette has become more generous. "Those shirts were tiny. If anything, we're cutting our shapes a lot bigger today, and it seems more modern to me," she added.Howell's take on modernity may well be rooted in tradition (the Wigmore Street store is also a great resource for books on classic mid-century design, and it has reissued British Ercol furniture from the late fifties), but unlike other London menswear brands that claim an aristocratic pedigree, her line's influences are more closely tied to the under-gardener than the baronet. The vital difference is that she makes humble pieces adapted to a modern environment. "I see what I do as urban," she said.
"It's inspired by English dress, and yes, it examines our culture, but fashion shouldn't be about a historical reenactment." That said, you'll never come across a digital print or a skinny jean in a Howell collection. Her personal favorite look from today's show was an oversize gray Macintosh teamed with a white pinstriped shirt, simply because she loves the combination of sharp white and gray. And that's the Howell continuum—neither so fashion-forward that it will burn out a season later, nor so stolid that you might as well seek out the vintage original.
15 June 2014
Resignation was a clear victor over enthusiasm when Margaret Howell conceded this morning that mounting a fashion show was "part of the job." Why she should subject herself to fashion week stress is a particularly relevant question for someone whose designs are so much more about "clothes" than "fashion," signifying maturity and intelligence and a lifestyle to which ten minutes on a catwalk can do scant justice. Still, Howell insisted that a show was actually a good way to get to know the clothes. "It's a kick when it works," she said. "I love getting something right. But the real result is what sells in the shop." That spirit of pragmatism sounded much closer to her heart.In the end, a winning narrative emerged from the small collection that Howell presented. It was darker in tone than usual ("A bit too dark," she worried), but that set off the deep violet of a shirt or the blue of a sweater. She also rationalized that the tweeds were darker because they were to be worn in the city rather than as "camouflage for the country." In fact, the notion of the country-comes-to-the-city offers itself as an ongoing Howell theme. Here, the subtly evolved outerwear, slightly boxy suiting, lug-soled shoes, and wide-brimmed hats hinted at the honesty and earnestness of a countryman in the process of being urbanized. The soundtrack seemed to agree, starting out with bucolic acoustic guitar and ending with the mutant funk of Talking Heads' "I-Zimba."
6 January 2014
Margaret Howell is the first to admit that there is nothing much new under her sun: "Our formula doesn't change from year to year," she said. "What we do is find the right fabric, the right details. How it's worn depends on the attitude of the wearer." It's this ethos that has kept the brand ticking for over forty years. It has also earned Howell a remarkably loyal fan base—most notably in Japan.The London fashion set crushed into her shop on Wigmore Street this morning to see her offering of workman's denim shirts, sensible anoraks, boxy suits, and baggy white trousers. The collection bore all of her hallmarks: a lot of gray, beige, and navy; fabrics in contrasting weights; and a spartan lack of fuss (a sailorlike hanky tied loosely around the neck was as fancy as it got)."It's hard to explain, but you can have a gray T-shirt from three years ago that you loved and wore to bits and all of a sudden, this year it may not feel right. I am here to tweak that for my clientele and set it right," the designer said. But with younger labels (like David Bradshaw's Hunter Gather a few shops down), shouldn't Howell up the ante a bit in the name of competitiveness? "Not in my case," she insisted. "I have been doing this since the seventies and am really fortunate my clients understand me and, in turn, I understand them. We are just striving for quality and continuum."
16 June 2013
After yet another presentation of subtly calibrated variations on a theme, the question had to be asked: What does Margaret Howell actually get out of doing a fashion show? Surely her clothes are made to be cherished by their ardent fans, not paraded like seasonal fripperies down a fashion catwalk. "I like styling," said the designer after her show. "I know straight away whether something works." Sothat'sit—she's doing a little market research.Howell definitely hit a timely note with her latest collection. It offered what felt like fifty shades of gray, in the nicest possible way. "A lot of fabrics only work in these colors," she explained. By that, she meant tweeds, herringbones, and flannels in soft tone-on-tone layers. Shades of earth and sky also snuck in, but the overall impression was the solidity of stone: an island off the coast of Scotland, perhaps, though that may have been the power of an argyle sweater's nostalgic suggestion. But the very notion of "power" has no place in Howell's ethos. Her new collection stayed true to her roots, harmonizing classic bits and pieces for a wardrobe of clothes designed to make you feel at one with the world.
7 January 2013
Margaret Howell's invitation featured an image of what looked like aged flagstones. It was actually a photo of the wooden floorboards in her London shop. Either way, enduring authenticity was the takeaway, which is just right for Howell. Her clothes age well, probably because there's already a hint of history in a piece like the bib-fronted shirt she showed here. And she was very taken with the kerchief she was wearing, something she'd resurrected from the eighties and reintroduced for Spring 2013.Like her friend Bruce Weber (who shot her first ad campaigns way back when), Howell has a formula that doesn't tire, which is how collections that change almost imperceptibly year on year can hold the interest so. The vision of an ideal, ordered world that they offer is quite seductive. Nothing jars. Here, for instance, ties matched shirts, and tones of blue and gray shaded soothingly together.However, change there was. "Style has to feel right for now," said Howell after the show. For Spring, "now" meant narrower, slightly cropped pants and a leaner torso. But it was a chambray parka that felt the right-est, exactly the kind of item—where form intelligently follows function—that keeps 'em coming back for more.
16 June 2012